Locked[Archive] Re: B-17 Bomb Load

[Archive] Re: B-17 Bomb Load

> The B-17 manual states that the emergency max gross weight of the B-17 is> 74,000 pounds. .......>.....> On page 317 of Martin Caiden's "THE B-17, THE FLYING FORTS" there is this> remarkable statement:> "When necessary, the B-17F could drag a staggering load of bombs into the> air. It was possible (and some bombers did so) to carry eight 1,600-pound> bombs in the internal bomb bay, as well as one 4,000-pounder tucked up> beneath each wing, for the overwhelming load of 20,800 pounds of bombs.....>......

? The manual I have indicates that only six 1600-pound bombswould fit int the bomb bay? It indicated to use stations7,10,18,28,31,39. It only listed one bomb type, AN-MKI for the1600lb, so perhaps there were other types of 1600lb bombs thatwere smaller?

Regardless, I would assume that the plane wouldn't be able to getup to high altitude with these large loads?

I was trying to use the various charts in the B-17 manuals tofigure out the range possible with different loads. There was a"range" chart that was only for 6000lb and 10,000lb bomb loads,and it didn't include climbing to altitude, so I tried using some ofthe other charts that gave fuel consumpion for climbing andcruising, etc.Basically, I wasn't able to figure it out. From what I was reading onthe charts, it didn't even look possible for the plane to get up toaltitude (ie 25,000') with a 6,000 pound load, or even with a 5,000pound load, that I know was commonly taken up to these altitudes,and the fuel consumption curves didn't seem to have entries forcruising with these loads. Could you help with some suggestions as to how to estimaterange at different altitudes and bomb loads from the charts in themanual? My main reason was in trying to explain why my father'ssquadron would have run out of fuel on a mission which would haveseemed to have been a relatively short mission (Bremmen). Theunusual thing which happened on this mission was that due toheavy clouds at takeoff, they had to climb to over 20,000' forassembly, instead of assembling at 8-10,000' as planned. From reading the charts, I'm guessing that a fully loaded B-17could only get up to 25,000' after it had lost some weight due tousing fuel, and that climbing up to 20,000 for assembly would haveused a LOT more fuel than normal? Would this be logical?

For the 20,000lb bomb load mentioned above, would they haveperhaps cut the fuel load in half to get down to the maximum loadlimits, which would reduce the range even further. The curves in themanual show the plane being able to climb up to about 10,000' witha load like that, but it would use nearly a third of it's fuel justgetting to altitude (assuming that they only put in about 1600gal toreduce the gross weight), so the range would be greatly reduced,but I'm really at a loss as to how to figure out what the range wouldbe. Anyway, I find this to be an interesting topic, and I'd really like tofigure out how to calculate how far these planes could go from thecharts and curves in the manuals, if anyone knows how.